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Becoming-Speckled Warbler: Re/creating Australian Natural History Pedagogy

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 March 2012

Alistair Stewart
Alistair Stewart*
Affiliation:
La Trobe University
*
†Address for correspondence: Alistair Stewart, Lecturer, Outdoor and Environmental Education, Faculty of Education, La Trobe University, PO Box 199, Bendigo, Victoria 3552, Australia. Email: a.stewart@latrobe.edu.au
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Abstract

The speckled warbler and other woodland birds of south-eastern Australia have declined dramatically since European settlement; many species are at risk of becoming locally and/or nationally extinct. Coincidently, Australian environmental education research of the last decade has largely been silent on the development of pedagogy that refects the natural history of this continent (Stewart, 2006). The current circumstances that face the speckled warbler, I argue, is emblematic of both the state of woodland birds of south-eastern Australia, and the condition of natural history pedagogy within Australian environmental education research. In this paper I employ Deleuze and Guattari's (1987) philosophy “becoming-animal” to explore ways that the life and circumstances of the speckled warbler might inform natural history focused Australian environmental education research. The epistemology and ontology of becoming-speckled warbler offers a basis to reconsider and strengthen links between Australian natural history pedagogy and notions of sustainability.

Keywords

natural historybecomingDeleuzepedagogy
Type
Feature Articles
Information
Australian Journal of Environmental Education , Volume 27 , Issue 1: Special Issue: The “ness” of Environmental Education , 2011 , pp. 68 - 80
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2011

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